The Doran Memorial Bridge is the twin pair of steel
girder bridge
A girder bridge is a bridge that uses girders as the means of supporting its deck. The two most common types of modern steel girder bridges are plate and box.
The term "girder" is often used interchangeably with "beam" in reference to bridge de ...
s that carry eight lanes of road traffic on
Interstate 280 over
San Mateo Creek near
Hillsborough, California
Hillsborough is an incorporated town in San Mateo County, California, in the San Francisco Bay Area. It is located south of San Francisco on the San Francisco Peninsula, bordered by Burlingame to the north, San Mateo to the east, Highlands-B ...
in
San Mateo County
San Mateo County ( ), officially the County of San Mateo, is a county located in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 764,442. Redwood City is the county seat, and the third most populated city following Daly ...
.
History
The Doran Memorial Bridge was originally known as the San Mateo Creek Bridge according to
Caltrans
The California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) is an Executive (government), executive department of the U.S. state of California. The department is part of the Government of California#State agencies, cabinet-level California State Tran ...
plans.
It was named the Eugene A. Doran Memorial Bridge in 1969, after the Hillsborough police officer who was killed near the site on August 5, 1959; Doran's widow attended the ribbon-cutting ceremony on May 28, 1969. In 2004, the bridge was rededicated as the Officer Eugene A. Doran and Marine Lance Corporal Patrick M. Doran Memorial Bridge to include his son, Patrick, who died in Vietnam on February 18, 1967 while serving in the
United States Marine Corps
The United States Marine Corps (USMC), also referred to as the United States Marines, is the maritime land force service branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for conducting expeditionary and amphibious operations through combi ...
.
Prior to the opening ceremony on May 28, 1969, a "Pedestrian Day" was held on May 25, with more than 30,000 crossing the new span on foot.
It won the Medium Span, High Clearance category in the 1970
AISC
The American Institute of Steel Construction (AISC) is a not-for-profit technical institute and trade association for the use of structural steel in the construction industry of the United States.
AISC publishes the Steel Construction Manual ...
steel bridges contest. Markers commemorating Eugene A. Doran and the AISC award are at the Crystal Springs Safety Roadside Rest Area off northbound I-280, approximately north of the bridge itself. That stop also features a statue of
Junipero Serra. The Doran Memorial Bridge was featured on the cover of the ''1972 Highway Statistics'' report published by the
Federal Highway Administration
The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) is a division of the United States Department of Transportation that specializes in highway transportation. The agency's major activities are grouped into two programs, the Federal-aid Highway Program a ...
with other recently completed major structures, including the
Verrazano-Narrows Bridge
The Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge ( ) is a suspension bridge connecting the New York City boroughs of Staten Island and Brooklyn. It spans the Narrows, a body of water linking the relatively enclosed New York Harbor with Lower New York Bay and th ...
, the
Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel Chesapeake often refers to:
*Chesapeake people, a Native American tribe also known as the Chesepian
* The Chesapeake, a.k.a. Chesapeake Bay
*Delmarva Peninsula, also known as the Chesapeake Peninsula
Chesapeake may also refer to:
Populated plac ...
, and the
Cowlitz River Bridge.
Design and construction
The bridge was designed by Caltrans architect Warren S. Ludlow, engineers Robert Cassano and Delmar Janson, with assistance from
Mario J. Ciampi
Mario Joseph Ciampi (April 27, 1907 – July 6, 2006) was an American architect and urban planner best known for his modern design influence on public spaces and buildings in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Biography
Ciampi's parents emigrated from ...
.
Ciampi was commissioned to design freeway structures for I-280 by the Division of Highways in 1963.
Four arched concrete piers support the twin girder bridges.
They use modified
Gothic arch
A pointed arch, ogival arch, or Gothic arch is an arch with a pointed crown, whose two curving sides meet at a relatively sharp angle at the top of the arch. This architectural element was particularly important in Gothic architecture. The earlie ...
es; the finish was left in the natural concrete color, and the surfaces were contoured to help them blend into their surroundings.
[ The twin bridges contain five parallel welded steel girders and are connected by a wide concrete slab.]Crystal Springs Dam
Crystal Springs Dam is a gravity dam constructed across the San Mateo Creek which is in San Mateo County, California. It impounds water to form the Lower Crystal Springs Reservoir which sits atop the San Andreas Fault in a rift valley created ...
, which was (at the time of its completion) the largest concrete structure in the world.
See also
* The Flintstone House
The Flintstone House is a free-form, single-family residence in Hillsborough, California overlooking and easily seen from the Doran Memorial Bridge carrying Interstate 280 (California), Interstate 280 over San Mateo Creek (San Francisco Bay Area), ...
References
External links
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Doran family
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* {{cite news , url = https://www.cacnews.org/news/2ndq08.pdf , title = Bridge 35-199 , author = Houde, John , date = 2008 , work = The CACNews , pages = 14–22 , publisher = California Association of Criminalists , access-date = August 16, 2018
Bridges in San Mateo County, California
Girder bridges
Road bridges in California
Steel bridges in the United States
Bridges completed in 1967
Bridges on the Interstate Highway System